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Pune’s Cyrus Poonawalla remains among India’s richest elite
Poonawalla is listed at 170th on the Forbes billionaires’ list for 2018, released on Wednesday with a net worth estimated to be $9.1 billion.
Cyrus Poonawalla, the chairman of Poonawalla Group which includes Serum Institute of India, has been a regular feature on the Forbes billionaire’s’ list.
In March 2017, he was listed as India’s number 7 on the richest billionaire’s’ list and 159th in the world, with a net worth of $ 8.1 billion.
Poonawalla is listed at 170th on the Forbes billionaires’ list for 2018, released on Wednesday with a net worth estimated to be $9.1 billion.
Poonawalla studied at The Bishop’s School in Pune and later graduated from Brihan Maharashtra College of Commerce (BMCC), University of Pune, in 1966. He was conferred the Padma Shri in 2005.
In 1966 he founded Serum Institute of India (SII) which launched its first therapeutic anti-tetanus serum within two years, and began producing the anti-tetanus vaccines.
By 1998, Serum Institute was exporting vaccines to over a 100 countries and by 2000 one out of every two children in the world was vaccinated by a vaccine of Serum Institute of India.
According to people who knows him closely, Poonawalla is passionate about horses and has strong ties with India’s horse racing and breeding Industry through the family’s Poonawalla Stud Farms, started by his late father and now run by him and his younger brother Zavaray.
His wife was the late Villoo Poonawalla and has a son Adar who is the chief executive officer (CEO) and executive director at the Serum Institute. He is passionate about cars and has a collection of sports cars and custom-built limousines.
